In January 2022, Biogen Inc. announced it had reached an agreement to sell its equity stake in the Samsung Bioepis joint venture to partner Samsung Biologics. On April 20, 2022, Samsung Biologics and Biogen announced that Samsung Biologics has now fully acquired Samsung Bioepis for a total consideration of USD $2.3 billion. With the completion of the first payment of USD $1.0 billion pursuant to the terms of the acquisition agreement, Samsung Biologics has now fully acquired Samsung Bioepis as a wholly owned subsidiary. Payment of the remaining USD $1.3 billion will be made in installments over two years.
John Rim, CEO and President of Samsung Biologics said that this announcement “marks a significant milestone for Samsung Biologics in our continued venture into the biosimilar business and accelerating biosimilar growth” and that “[b]y leveraging our extensive experience as a leading CDMO, we will further contribute to saving lives of the patients and address a wide array of diseases.” Samsung Biologics also states that it is currently building another plant which will become operation in October 2022, and “is in the process of securing additional land of 350,000 m2 for Bio Campus II, which will be 30% larger than the size of the current site for future growth.”
According to Biogen, it will continue to work together with Samsung Bioepis “with their exclusive agreements, including the commercialization of their current biosimilars portfolio,” including BENEPALI (etanercept), FLIXABI (infliximab), IMRALDI (adalimumab) in Europe, “and the potential upcoming launches of BYOOVIZ and the potential filings for SB15 in major markets worldwide.” BYOOVIZ (ranibizumab-nuna) is a biosimilar to LUCENTIS® (ranibizumab), approved by FDA in September 2021 SB15 is Biogen’s biosimilar candidate referencing EYLEA (aflibercept). Biogen also states that it “plans to pursue further biosimilar opportunities in order to provide patient access to biologic medicines and to contribute to healthcare sustainability.”